In what seems like a battle of ants in a case full of lions, Practical Technology has learned that Xandros has bought Linspire. "In an announcement that was sent out today, June 30, to Linspire stockholders, CEO Larry Kettler wrote that the stockholders had decided to sell all of Linspire's assets. This deal specifically includes Linspire, Freespire, and the company's distribution agnostic CNR (Click 'N Run) desktop installation platform." Not everyone is very happy with this one, though.
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Member since:2005-11-10
You are right. What was so stupid is they based Linspire on the cutting edge Ubuntu and not LTS. Soon as Ubuntu came out with a new version 6 months later, Linspire was now behind and is still behind.
STUPID.
Also to be honest almost all distros based on KDE are stuck. KDE 4 is still not ready for prime time. so that adds to troubles for distros.
Linspire and Xandros are in limbo ether way!
Good bye Linspire! Good bye!
Member since:2005-07-06
"Also to be honest almost all distros based on KDE are stuck. KDE 4 is still not ready for prime time. so that adds to troubles for distros."
IMO, distributions aiming "at granny" should simply stay with KDE3.5 for quite a while, or at least until KDE4 becomes rock-solid and feature complete.
Heck, I am not "a granny", but I am choosing to stay with KDE3.5 for quite a while.
Member since:2006-12-16
That's the typical business approach I'm afraid - the only one that matters is the share holders. Customers are NOT important. That's why you were not asked [about the move from Debian sources to Ubuntu, or the sale of the Lindows name for that matter]. That's why your post on the forums was promptly deleted. They simply don't care.
That should have been warning enough to get rid of them.
I personally have always wondered why Xandros and Linspire were so popular - they attempted to lock you into their private repositories, an act which is decidedly anti open source. There were compatibility issues between Xandros and Debian sources for a long time as well, at least if my memory serves me correct.
Good riddance to one of them, hopefully both of them soon. Open source has no need of Microsoft lackies.
Dave
Member since:2005-07-06
According to Kevin Carmony, former President and CEO of Linspire, they disregarded the shareholders as well:
http://kevincarmony.blogspot.com/2008/06/xandros-acquires-linspire-...
Member since:
2005-07-06
To be perfectly honest, both distributions did good things regarding ease of use and user friendliness in the past. At the time, they were the first to aim at Windows converts, they wanted their distros to be so easy that even granny shouldn't have problems. Even if I never used their distros for longer than a couple of hours, I liked the idea, I have always been in favour of "Linux for the masses"
Also, their releases were very stable, even if already out of date from day one.
The latest official Xandros release is based on Debian Sarge! (But there is a "developer" one based on Etch, rather easy to find).
As to Linspire, I helped them with their Microsoft litigation by becoming a lifetime member ($100).
Nobody has been more ignored than us lifetime members.
Did they ask us if we agreed when the signed an agreement with Microsoft? Did they ask when they moved to Ubuntu (instead of Debian)?
IMO, the latter was their undoing. Who needed yet another Ubuntu derivative? And what had been a rock-solid distribution suddenly became a problematic one.
When I complained in their forums about the total lack of respect for us lifetime members, my post was promptly deleted.
What now? If they can give some real contribution to the Linux community they'll get my support. Otherwise, good luck to them.